


It suits you

by Dooiney_Oie



Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: Canon Non-Binary Character, Getting into Nureyev's internalised ageism & getting the poor man to Calm Down, Light sex references, Mostly just Soft tbh, Nureyev please go to therapy challenge, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-06
Updated: 2020-05-06
Packaged: 2021-03-03 03:22:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,377
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24038053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dooiney_Oie/pseuds/Dooiney_Oie
Summary: You may tire of me,As our December sun is setting,'Cause I'm not who I used to be.-The Carte Blanche is in the early hours of its circadian cycle, drifting smoothly through space in the orbit of a small, barren planet, and Peter Nureyev is lying in bed staring at his own ceiling.
Relationships: Peter Nureyev/Juno Steel
Comments: 24
Kudos: 208





	It suits you

**Author's Note:**

> As mentioned in the tags, this features a lot of internalised ageism/ableism on nureyev's part, as well as some very light sex references. There's also some playful joking about using sex as a reward but it's not at all serious and just silly flirting
> 
> Summary is from death cab for cutie's "brothers on a hotel bed" which I promise is way less of a weird companion song to this than it sounds lol. Set in some vague future time where these two are more secure and also the carte blanche and the crew are all fine because I say so

The Carte Blanche is in the early hours of its circadian cycle, drifting smoothly through space in the orbit of a small, barren planet, and Peter Nureyev is lying in bed staring at his own ceiling.

He's an early riser, but he's come to the realisation recently that he doesn't know if that's something he does naturally or if it's something he's forced himself into out of habit. The same goes for the way he adjusts his glasses, the amount of sugar he takes in his tea, or if he even really likes tea at all - ever since setting foot on this ship, he's spent more and more time thinking about these uncertainties. About how many of his idiosyncrasies aren't actually his at all, just ones he's trained himself to think are his after so long playing role after role. So he lies awake in the dim light of simulated early mornings with no-one but his own unfamilar self for company, and he tries to get to know him. 

The covers shift next to him, shortly followed by the sound of light snoring as the source of the commotion settles again in a different position. Peter can't help but smile, even if he does look a fool for it when the only recipient is his own ceiling. That's one thing he can't doubt about himself, at least; he's never had to force himself to love Juno Steel. Quite the opposite, really.

He carefully props himself up on his side for a better look, finding Juno's face mushed into his pillow with his mouth half-open. He's drooling slightly, and the pillow has left marks across his cheek. Peter has never seen anything more beautiful in his life. And as with all beautiful things, the sight of it awakens a habitual itch at the ends of his fingertips.

He reaches out. Traces feather-light over the crow's feet, the frown lines, all the patterns of creases visible even on a face so slack with sleep, grooves that are cut short in places by scars before continuing on again. Smooths his thumb over the greys at his temples that are poking out from underneath his skewed sleeping cap. Peter loves them. Every mark he so hates on himself looks just beautiful on Juno. He wears his age with a dignity that Peter himself can't seem to match, always so unselfconscious about his scars or premature wrinkles.

The idleness of the motion gets him to thinking, though: how long has it been since he touched up his roots? Things have been so busy recently that he'd lost track entirely - if they'd started the most recent operation last Wednesday, then...

"There more'vm r'somethin'?"

Peter starts. Juno has his eye cracked open, looking up at him with something cautious, something curious - something a little amused, perhaps. Peter retracts his hand in more of a hurry than he really should have if he was hoping to seem casual, and then clears his throat in an even worse attempt at covering that up.

"I'm sorry?"

Juno stifles a yawn, shuffling his face more comfortably into his pillow even as he mumbles, "You've been tryna rub away my greys for the last ten minutes."

"Oh." Despite himself, Peter can feel his skin flushing. Caught red-handed once again, it seems. Juno is rather good at doing that to him. "I was - only admiring them, actually. I didn't mean to wake you."

Juno blinks slowly up at him, his half-open eye sleepy but still a detective's eye - dangerously sharp, and a thorn in the side of even a master con. "Admiring, huh?"

Peter offers him a shrug that's more casual than he feels. "Of course. They look very good on you."

"Had 'em for long enough," Juno snorts softly, smile wry but full of good humour. Less uncertain than it used to be, and maybe it's Peter's focus on appreciating that that means his guard is down when Juno bites his lip and asks, "...But not on you?"

Peter looks quickly away, unable to help it. Of course, he knows that Juno has long-since catalogued the hair dye he keeps tucked away in his desk drawer, as well as how religiously he tends to his skin, and his make-up. No matter his current job description, his love will always be a detective at heart, and this was always bound to come up eventually. That still doesn't make him want to discuss it.

He must have stayed quiet for too long, because when Juno speaks again it's with that same apologetic nervousness that he was so rife with the first time they saw each other again after Hyperion. These days he only ever hears it when Juno thinks he's put his foot in his mouth - which, to be completely fair, he often has. "You - uh, never mind, I didn't-- Just forget I said anything, I didn't - doesn't matter."

Peter sighs as he sits up in earnest - not to leave, however, only making himself feel less exposed. He knows he shouldn't just file this away, that Juno is trying to bring up a sensitive topic only so that he can better understand it. That's not unusual. They talk more openly now than they did before, often about things like this, laying the rawest of their hurts out between them. Juno's fear that he'll never come close to regaining the sharpshooter's accuracy he once had, Peter's confession that sometimes his own name sounds unsettlingly foreign to him, both of their assorted nightmares carefully uprooted from three decades or more of trauma. Things always feel tender, but... clean, at the end of it, the difference between a wound left alone to fester and one that's been stitched and tended to. Why should this hurt be any different?

"...Doesn't it bother you?" he murmurs, as if by making his words quieter he can also make them lighter. "Watching your own body, everything that you are, deteriorate as you stand by helpless?"

He doesn't look back over at Juno, but he can see the frown creasing his brows clear as day. "Honestly, Nureyev..."

Juno gives a sigh of his own, rolls over onto his back to look at the ceiling, and with the knowledge that he's no longer being actively watched Peter finds it easier to look back at him over his shoulder while he waits for him to finish chewing his words over.

"When I was nineteen, I never really expected to make it to twenty," he says after a moment. "When it happened anyway, I still didn't think I'd manage twenty-one. When I hit twenty-one..." He shrugs and wrinkles his nose, waving the rest of the sentence off. "You get the idea. I used to throw myself into cases so hard that nothing else mattered, so looking in the mirror every so often and realising I'd gotten older was always a surprise, but now, it's... well, still kind of a surprise, honestly. But I'm tryna be grateful about it." Another yawn tugs at his mouth as he rubs at his empty eye socket with a shrug. "Gift I've been given, or whatever. 'Sides, have you _seen_ the rest of the crew? They're all five years older than you at least, n'you try 'n' tell me any one of 'em is _deteriorating_."

Reluctantly, Peter leans back onto his hands. Juno does have something of a point, perhaps. Being old is certainly better than being dead, and it's true that the rest of the crew remains more than competent, but...

"Truth be told, Juno, it... really terrifies me," he admits quietly - has to force himself to admit, really, but if this is a habit he's training himself into, he at least knows that it's a good one. "So much of my work is based on charm, on methods of seduction that... I'm not certain I can sell any more. Not without makeup, jewellery, all these - masks and distractions." He swallows, runs his fingers along his jaw where he's sure the skin is slowly falling looser. "I feel like every year my repertoire grows narrower and narrower. And with how dangerous this profession is, I can't afford to start forgetting things, or missing things, or..."

He trails off, anxiety whisking away what's left of his breath. Juno's hand touches his wrist as a comforting weight, but he doesn't say anything yet. He's quiet for a long time, long enough that Peter feels the need to cast a nervous glance his way. He's frowning at him, which might have been a worry but for the fact that it's the frown he gets when he's trying to mentally work through a problem. It's been long enough that Peter can make that distinction now, and the thought is settling, if strange. He's not used to knowing people long enough to become overly familiar with their habits - not unconsciously, anyway. He supposes, in a way, that may be why his own are so alien to him.

Eventually Juno blinks, cocks his head and says, "Y'know what a silver fox is, Nureyev?"

Peter returns him a look of fond confusion, quirks an eyebrow. "Valuable?"

Juno snorts at him like he's an idiot, but the look on his face is just as fond as Peter's own. "S'a bit of old earth slang. Heard it on one of Rita's streams." He reaches up and gently pulls Peter back down onto the bed, pushing himself up on one elbow to lean over him at the same time. "It _means_ ," he says, and presses a kiss to his neck, over his pulse, "a very" - another to his jaw - "sexy" - his mouth, next, and then he leans back slightly and gently adjusts the fall of Peter's hair around his face - "older man."

Peter opens his mouth to protest or refute the implications of that particular string of words, but then shuts it and worries at his lip as he forces himself to actually consider them first, as is their rule. No snap reactions. And maybe the phrase isn't so bad as it sounds. _Grey_ is such an ugly word - such a dull, flat colour - but _silver_...

Oh, Juno knows him too well, doesn't he?

"Could you give an example?"

"Jet," Juno says, and giggles when Peter smacks him lightly in the shoulder for the tease, the sound almost sweet enough to earn him forgiveness. It doesn't matter how secure they are now, or how disinterested Jet is, Juno knows how little it takes to make him horribly jealous. "Okay - okay, um... how about François Nguyen?"

"...The dancer?"

"Mm-hm."

Peter takes a moment to mull it over. Nguyen was the top of his field in his heyday, and though that time has long since passed he still maintains a position of honour among his peers. He still dances beautifully. And he's still very handsome, even well into his fifties - wrinkled, yes, and grey, but still attractive. Distinguished, even. The thought of watching himself wither into a pathetic, frail old man scares Peter like nothing else, but someone like that... the thought sits much more comfortably under his skin, doesn't prick his pride so badly.

"Always thought you looked like a fox," Juno is saying, the fingers of the hand not propping up his chin tracing idle patterns over Peter's cheekbones and hairline. "Dunno if I ever told you that."

"I don't believe you did," Peter replies absently, still mostly inside his head.

"Mmn. Think it's the teeth."

Juno yawns, outright this time, and then settles his head back down again, pillowing it on Peter's shoulder. It must be a horribly uncomfortable place to lie, bony as it is, but Juno never seems to care. "Point is," he sighs out, "I think silver'd suit you."

"Eventually," he adds after a second, "I mean seriously, Nureyev, you're only thirty-eight. That's barely even middle-aged, never mind _old_ , are you kidding me?"

Peter huffs a laugh, despite himself. There's his Juno. Achingly sweet, and staggeringly blunt. He's also probably right. Peter's not so sure that will make him love or even like the bags under his eyes or the lines deepening around his mouth, and it doesn't banish the spectre of old age still looming on his horizon, but at least he can think that someone might still look at him fondly even after his looks and skills have faded. It's a nice thought.

"Well," he says through the beginnings of a smile. "In that case, thank you for stroking my ego so thoroughly."

He feels Juno smile into his collarbone, nip gently at the crook of his neck. "Can stroke more than that if you want."

"Or," Peter counters, trailing his fingers lightly down the divot of Juno's spine and delighting in his shiver. "You could let me return the favour. Put us on level ground, as it were."

Juno laughs at him. Peter has never been less offended in his life. "Quid pro quo?"

"You should consider yourself lucky, my services are very highly rated."

"Mmn," Juno hums into his mouth as Peter flips them both and presses him back into his pillow with a kiss. "I can imagine."

He gasps when Peter applies his teeth to his throat - only gently, but the effect on Juno's heartrate is close to immediate. Peter closes his eyes and decides to focus on nothing but that.

"Nureyev?"

"Mmn?" Peter hums in acknowledgement, more focused on tracing the stubbled line of Juno's jaw with his mouth, but Juno puts a hand to his chin and guides him up to meet and hold his eye.

"Listen, I mean it," he says. "I know it doesn't matter, but - I don't think you're ever gonna stop being the most beautiful man I know. If you'll let me stick around to find out."

Peter kisses the breath out of him for that. Then he ducks his head back down to Juno's neck before he can see the mess of his flushed face or misty eyes - because there's the feeling. Painful, but clean. Inexpert stitches applied with the utmost care. Maybe one day it will even heal.

"I'd be glad to have you, darling. Now let's get these off so I can show you _I_ mean it when I say thank you."

And god, but he means it.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed it, please consider dropping a kudos and/or comment, I don't have the energy to reply to people much atm but I really appreciate them ❤


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